Zakath – As to
Let me review my point, one more time. I'll use short words so you'll understand my point this time.
1. This is a debate on the existence of deity, not the origins of the universe. I am not going to explain how everything got here.
2. Re-read the posts. I think you'll see that ad hominems are flowing freely from both sides.
1 – Fine. But you do have faith in something for the existence of the world, don’t you? And if it’s aliens or some rather unscientific or contradictory theory, or something that is beyond your understanding, then just say so. From my understanding, without a creator, the universe is more than a mystery, it’s a contradiction to hard science. But then again, I don’t believe in perpetual motion machines and that something can come from nothing.
2 – I am including or perhaps highlighting your attitude you are presenting here in this thread. You have a large amount of personal slam and are somewhat thin on concrete argument. For you to criticize Bob for not understanding your points is quite a mistake, and the fact of your missing his points rather completely makes you look quite the fool, especially while claiming your points may be beyond Bob’s comprehension.
I hope you will focus on the content offered, and try to understand it “prior” to responding.
Your attitude merely serves to demonstrate my point. Your preconceptions would blind you to anything I wrote, no matter how well presented.
Not true. I haven’t even broached the topic of the content of any of your points. We are a bit alike, in that it is much easier to criticize, than to positively lead and teach and persuade. It’s the old destruction is an easier process than building idea.
But as to your first point, I hope you are not suggesting that we should eliminate the areas of discussion that directly impact the answer to the question, does God exist. As you know, the God that Bob is referencing, is the God of the Bible (although he is not gone that far yet), and one of God’s most common calling cards says that He created the universe, and that the universe declares Him, and that all who has lived has known rather significant aspects of who God is by the evidence provided by the created universe. So the evidence that the universe provides may help to substantiate God’s claims that He is the creator of the world.
After all, we can’t just get in our car and travel to God’s place and ask Him directly if He exists or not. 
No one is claiming that God is provable beyond the shadow of any doubt, like trying to prove that television works in America, so touching on the most verifiable claims of God’s existence, such as Him being the creator of the entire world, is an important and highly approachable issue. I give credit to the sciences as a means for discovering truth, so I don’t dismiss science out of hand just because it doesn’t explain everything completely and absolutely.
Also, no one is saying that you can’t disbelieve in God. Obviously you can, and quite apparently, you do. So we have to move beyond what you and I “think” is true, we have to venture beyond ourselves in order deal with the issue of the existence of God, a topic that is manifestly beyond ourselves. A child can say, food comes from the grocery store, but the grown up person knows better, not because he particularly saw all of the food being elsewhere nurtured and protected and grown and harvested and processed and packaged and delivered and stocked and shelved, etc. But because we are reasonable rational beings, and we understand the various processes of life through our reasoning and experience even though we were not there when it happened, we conclude quite rationally that the food does not originate from the stores, and we know where it came from instead. (That is, if you are a reasonable and rational person, and not like an ignorant child.)
So if you don’t know the origin of the universe or life, or how self-consciousness or love could originate, then just deal honestly with the apparent lack of understanding and say you don’t know. Don’t make Bob play twenty questions just to get to the bottom of your response to his line of questioning.
We can know significant things even though we see some things dimly for the time being.
"I don't know," is a valid response, even if it's not one you wish to hear.
Not at all, I’d much rather hear you humbly admit ignorance than to claim for example to understand what Bob has been saying in ways that are quite different than what he has said. You did not say, I don’t know to several of Bob’s questions, instead, as Bob has been recording for posterities sake, you have avoided several questions, and this aversion is somewhat of a pattern and may be growing. That is why I am being critical.
“Fear” of the line of reasoning presented to “you”. Bob is presenting his position for why one should believe that God exists. It totally up to you to thoughtfully consider his presentation and respond accordingly, or to dismiss what he has said out of hand without treating it with a direct response. I “could” go back and count your aversions to Bob’s points and direct questions, but Bob has been keeping track of this quite well on his own.
As to why I think you are being so aversive. Frankly, I don’t think you did it on purpose, , , I’m going to take a risk here, hoping that you will accept what I have to say strictly in the way I present it and not otherwise. I think you are willfully lazy, you don’t want to deal with the evidence provided before you, because it is much easier and far less disturbing for you to not honestly deal with the evidence for the existence of God. After all, if you are wrong, you would have made yourself into the grossest mockery, apparently starting out on God’s side, and then turning against Him and even believing that He doesn’t exist. You should be able to admit it, that if you were somehow converted back into faith in God, the level of treachery and treason you would feel in and for yourself would be , , , tremendous and probably quite terrible. But of course, if you previously knew God’s gracious forgiveness and how we do nothing to deserve His mercy and forgiveness, then such pain would be cured in time. You have quite a bit of personal investment at stake, which makes your level of objectivity,,, suspect, especially since your behavior indicates a reluctance to face the matter without scrambling it up.
I think it would be great if you were a bit more thoughtful and amiable. If a term or concept is too vague for you, then clarify, if you aren’t sure about the focus of Bob’s point, then ask for clarification before you assume wrongly. Etc. etc. etc.
Oh, I noticed you responded to
heusdens in follow up to our discussion.
OK. It is strongly connected, but not essential to demonstrating the existence of deity.
If you are going to be rational, you should not dismiss an entire area of information prior to understanding it.
You come home, you find a package on your door step, now, you could predetermine that the package came from nowhere, that noone delivered it, noone created it, noone thought of giving it to you in the first place. And, if you had an invested interest in the belief that it somehow came into existence and delivered itself, by itself, then no one could convince you of the truth of the matter, if you were that closed minded. However, a reasonable person would consider the fact that things don’t come from nothing, and that the package is utterly wrought with design and intellectual purpose, and after considering the many delivery services, and the likelihood that the package had an origin and a creator, etc, one would rationally determine that the box appeared sometime in the past because of these reasonable evidences and presumptions.
Trust me, nothing comes from nothing, and if you are the first person to discover the perpetual motion machine, you will really make the news! :bannana:
